Magic School Headmistress
by Orange Bulldog
Summary: Willow comes to San Francisco to be the new Headmistress of Magic School. Obviously she becomes friends and eventually more with the Charmed Ones. Crossover with Charmed. WillowPhoebe mainly, so femslash!
1. Willow

Disclaimers:

These are obviously not my characters, I'm just borrowing them from Joss Whedon, Aaron Spelling, and anyone else who owns them.

If you have issues with people of the same sex loving each other, or live someplace where that's illegal (in which case, consider moving) please move on.

I got this idea from a long-ago TWOP forum poll about who should be the new Magic School director. Set in early S7 of Charmed and about a year after Buffy's finale.

Pairing: Willow/Phoebe, eventually Xander/Paige

* * *

Willow Rosenberg rested her head on her left hand, scrolling through the webpage currently on her screen. She wasn't getting anywhere on this latest threat, and she'd been searching for hours. Finally she stood up, stretched, and walked down the hall to Giles' office.

She walked through Giles' door, but halted when she realized he was on the phone. She leaned against the doorframe and let her thoughts wander, trying not to eavesdrop.

It had been three months since she had come to work for Giles and the new Council in London, after her ugly breakup with Kennedy. The job was interesting enough, if a little boring. And hey, it gave her something to do, and of course she didn't mind working closely with Giles again. She'd missed her mentor.

"Willow!" the redhead looked up, startled out of her reverie by an amused looking Giles.

"Uh, sorry, I was just thinking, guess I drifted off." She grinned at the older man.

"Sit down, Willow." He leaned back in his chair and took off his glasses as she sat down in a chair facing his desk.

"Uh oh, you're cleaning the glasses, what's wrong?" she asked warily.

"Why do you automatically assume something is wrong? Perhaps I simply have some dust on the lenses." He argued.

"Giles."

He sighed. "It's nothing wrong, per se. Willow, are you happy here?"

"What? Of course I am, why wouldn't I be."

"I don't know, I just feel as if you are restless. I wouldn't blame you, after all those years of constant action, now to be here in a desk job must be a change."

Willow paused. "Well, yeah, okay, that's true, but I'm fine Giles, don't worry about me, I like helping out."

"I just received a call. There's a magic school in San Francisco in need of a director."

"A magic school?" Willow's eyes lit up as they did now again whenever magic was mentioned. "And they want you to direct it?"

"Er, not exactly. They wanted me to find a director. I was thinking about you." He waited for this to sink in.

"Me?? You want ME to be the director of a magic school?" her eyes widened.

"Yes. I think you'd be perfect, actually. My contact is also concerned about the non-magical areas of education, apparently those have been falling behind even before the director was killed. The old headmaster was an elder, albeit a rogue one, and he was pressuring the faculty to drop the non-magical studies. A Charmed One has been keeping it open since his death, but it's in jeopardy of closing if they can't find another headmaster. As far as I know it's the only school of its kind in America, and this would be a tragic loss."

"The old director was killed?" Willow asked suspiciously.

"Apparently it was unrelated to the school. The story is that he had become delusional and decided that a son of one of the Charmed Ones was a risk. In trying to kill the boy he was killed himself."

"Whoa. Wait the Charmed Ones, you mean the Halliwell sisters?"

Giles nodded. "I see you've heard of them."

"Well yeah, I've been doing research on witchy things for years, how could I not? They're like the most powerful witches on earth right now."

Giles gave her a look. "You do realize that most people would put you quite close to the top on that list." He said quietly.

"Oh no, not anymore, not me." She shook her head, whipping her hair around.

"Willow. You permanently changed the slayer line. Besides, I actually think that your earlier mishaps might serve you well in this capacity. Some of these students are there because there is concern about which side they will choose. It's important that they choose the side of good."

Willow's eyes went wide. "You think I can help them do that?"

"You understand the temptation." He said bluntly. "Willow, I will always regret that I did not do more to help you resist the dark side, because I also understood the temptations. Instead I tried to pretend my past had never happened. You can never change your past, but maybe something good can come out of it."

The redhead sat, stunned, at Giles's words. Could she really do this?

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	2. Paige

Disclaimers in part 1.

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Paige Matthews sat rubbing her temples in her office at Magic School. Why oh why had she offered to do this? She wasn't cut out to be a principal! She had gotten off the phone with a Mr. Giles at the slayers' Council twenty minutes ago, and in those twenty minutes she was hoping even more that he could find her a replacement. She had had two angry parents, three problem students, and a panicking first year teacher in her office. She'd done the best she could to fix all of their problems, but it was giving her a killer migraine. And it was only 9:30 in the morning.

Suddenly the phone rang.

"Hello? Mr. Giles, wow I wasn't expecting to hear from you yet."

She listened for a few moments.

"Already! Oh my gosh! No, no, don't worry about plane tickets, I'll come get her. When do you think she'll be ready? A day, wow, that's awesome. 9am tomorrow? Hmm well that's let's see… midnight here, you think she could be ready by 8? Great! If you could just give me your address and your office number….okay then. I'll see you tomorrow morning then! You have no idea how grateful I am Mr. Giles. I look forward to meeting you."

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That night, after making it through her day solely on the knowledge that if would be one of her last directing the magic school, Paige sat watching TV mindlessly, waiting for eleven so that she could orb to London and pick up the new director.

"You okay sweetie? Want me to keep you company?" Phoebe offered, sitting down and putting her arm around her sister.

"No, I'm fine, besides it's almost 11, I'm going to go soon."

"You taking her straight to Magic School?"  
"Yeah, we finished clearing out Gideon's room today, and anyway it's morning for her so she probably will want to get started settling in and everything."

"Okay. See you in the morning." She kissed Paige's forehead and headed upstairs.

Ten minutes later, Paige stood up, stretched, and disappeared.

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She reappeared seconds later in the middle of Rupert Giles' office. He blinked, but having been told about her orbing yesterday he wasn't too surprised.

"You must be Paige." He said, walking around his desk to shake her hand.

"Mr. Giles, so nice to meet you. Is Willow here yet?"

"Yes, she left her things at her apartment, I hope that's okay. I figured you two could stop by there on the way?" he asked.

"Oh sure, that's fine."

"She's just in her office." He led the way down the hall and into Willow's now-cleared-out office.

"Willow? Paige is here."

The redhead was standing with her back to the door, looking out of the window. She turned around and smiled.

"Hi, nice to meet you Paige." She walked over to grasp the other witch's hand.

"Nice to meet you too. I owe you big time for this. I don't know how much Mr. Giles told you, but I was way over my head, and I really don't have the time anyway, I was always being called away for demon attacks and such."

"Well, happy I could help. I'm pretty useful with the demon attacks too if I do say so myself, so if you ever need help with that, especially on the research end, I'm your gal." She turned to Giles. "I guess we should get going then Giles. I'll miss you." She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed tight. "It's been great working with you again."

"Hey, anytime you want to see him let me know, intercontinental orbing is a snap." Paige offered.

"Thanks, I may take you up on that." Willow smiled warmly at her. "So, should we go? Did Giles tell you we have to stop at my apartment to get my stuff? Is that okay, I can have Giles ship it if it's not, it's not a lot anyway…I'm so excited about orbing! Wow and I'm going back to California, I've never been to San Francisco, that's so strange I mean Sunnydale wasn't that far away."

Paige blinked, trying to follow the topic changes. "Uh, well, it's a nice city, I mean I think it is. So if you just take my hand we can orb to your apartment to get your things. Thanks Mr. Giles!" she felt a warmth in her left hand as Willow's slender fingers slipped into her own.

"Bye Giles. See you soon." Willow grinned as she disappeared.

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"Wow! That was SO cool!" Willow gushed as she realized she was standing in her living room. "It's like nothing happened only we're here! Wow!"

"Yep. You get used to it, but it's definitely nice. So what do you need to bring?" "Oh, just those two suitcases over there, and my laptop case. Uh, I don't have furniture, this was with the apartment, is that okay? I mean…."

"Oh yeah, there's furniture in your room at the school. You'll be set. So you grab the laptop and one suitcase, I'll get the other."

Before she knew it, Willow was orbing again, this time reappearing in a nice sized bedroom with antique-looking furniture in it.

"Oh wow, this is nice."

"Glad you like it." Paige set down the suitcase she was holding, watching Willow do the same and then place the laptop on a table nearby.

"You want me to give you the tour before I head home?" Paige offered.

"Oh I don't want to put you out, it must be really late to you right?"

"Eh, midnight or so. Not too bad."  
"No, that's fine, go home and get some sleep. I'll just get unpacked here, I can explore a little on my own, and I should take a nap too, try to get onto the right time."

"All right, if you're sure…."

"I'm sure. I'll see you in the morning Paige."

Paige smiled as she orbed out.

"That's going to take some getting used to, even for you Rosenberg, and you're used to strange things." Willow said to herself.

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	3. Phoebe

Disclaimers in part 1.

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Over the next few days Willow spent a lot of time with Paige, as she showed her around the school, introduced her to all of the students and faculty, and helped her get settled. Willow enjoyed being around a woman close to her age again; she hadn't made any friends in London and spent most of her free time with Giles. She still missed Buffy immensely but she felt Paige becoming a good friend quickly.

Her phone rang.

"Hello, Magic School, Ms. Rosenberg speaking."

"Willow, check you out." Came the familiar voice.

"Buffy! I know, crazy right? I'm all principal-y." she grinned. "I was just thinking about you. What's up?"

"Oh, the usual, weirdness in Rome Giles wants me to check out, he was going to call you and have you check out the computer side of things but I said I'd call instead, we haven't talked much lately. You like Magic School?"

"Yeah. I need to get out though, I haven't even seen the city yet. Maybe I'll see if Paige can show me around soon."

"Paige? Who's Paige?" Buffy asked in a teasing tone.

"She's the youngest of the Charmed Ones, the witches I was telling you about."

"Uh huh, you two been spending a lot of time together?"

"Oh don't start Buffy, she's totally straight, and besides I don't think I'm ready for another relationship yet. What about you, how's Mr. Immortal doing." She asked in a sarcastic tone. She didn't like Buffy's new boyfriend.

"Same old same old." Buffy didn't rise to the bait.

"You talked to Spike yet?" Willow asked in a gentler tone. Buffy had been really thrown when they'd found out he was back.

Buffy sighed. "No. I talked to Angel the other day on the phone, but I didn't have the nerve to ask to talk to him. What am I supposed to say, 'Hi, I've known you were back for months but I didn't know how to say welcome back, I'm glad you're uh, dead again?'"

"It's only going to get harder the longer you wait." Willow pointed out rationally.

"Can't I just put it off forever?" Buffy whined childishly.

"Buffy. Hey have you talked to Xander lately, I need to call and tell him where I am."

"Oh! I almost forgot! Yeah I talked to him yesterday, he said he might come visit for a while, if you were up to that."

"Of course! Maybe I can talk him into staying, find him a job at the school." She mused. "I worry about him roaming all around by himself."

"It's okay to say you miss him."

"Well yeah that too."

The friends talked for awhile longer, until Willow pointed out that Buffy wanted her to check out the demon online and she should get to it.

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"Knock knock." Paige stuck her head into Willow's office. "Are you still working? Take a break girl!" she teased.

Willow stretched. "I had a long day, spent most of it with a student, and Buffy asked me to check some stuff out for her." She explained.

"Well, I think you need a break. Piper's making dinner, she and Phoebe still haven't met you, you know. She told me to invite you."

"Oh, that sounds great." She cocked her head. "How do we get there? I haven't left the school since I got here."

"Easiest way is just to orb, since I'm here." She stretched out her hand. Willow took it and then she was standing in an airy living room.

"Hey, nice place." She complimented her friend.

"It takes some keeping up with all the demon attacks, but thank you." Willow turned around at the voice.

"I'm Piper." The woman said. "You must be Willow, we've heard all about you."

"Oh, it's nice to meet you!" Willow grinned.

"Where's Phoebs?" Paige asked, but Piper had barely opened her mouth to answer when the front door slammed and a slim brunette appeared.

"Sorry, sorry, ran into a de…A! A DA, um, yeah, I ran into a DA that I know and…" she tried to change topics when she saw the unfamiliar redhead.

"This is Willow, you can say demon." Paige said, stopping her sister.

"Whew! Cuz I have no idea where I was going with that!" Phoebe grinned, and stuck out her hand to greet the redhead.

"You ran into a demon? Anything we need to take care of?" Piper asked, concerned.

"Actually no, it's a long story but it's fine now. So, Willow, good to finally meet you. Paige is really glad not to be running Magic school anymore." Willow felt a tingle as she shook the witch's hand.

"I'm glad to be here too. Though it's strange not to be fighting every day. I mean not that I did much physical fighting, Buffy and now the other slayers take care of that, but not to be in the thick of things. You guys know about the slayers right?" she asked, when she noticed Piper and Phoebe were staring at her with slightly glazed looks.

"They know about slayers, I think they're just a bit dazed by the Willow-babble." Paige teased her friend.

Willow turned slightly red. "Sorry about that, I tend to do that when I get nervous, and I don't really know why I'm nervous right now, well except that you guys are like the most powerful witches in the world, so hello, who wouldn't be nervous? Oh no I'm doing it again, Paige it's your job to stop that okay?" she physically clapped her hand over her mouth.

Piper was still just staring at her, but Phoebe and Paige cracked up.

"Come on Piper, let's go get dinner okay? Anything I can help with?" Paige pulled her sister away before her friend got too embarrassed.

"It must be so cool to have sisters." Willow said, watching them go.

Phoebe rolled her eyes. "Well, not all the time of course, but I love them. You don't have any I take it?"

"Nope, only child. Xander was like a brother growing up, well until I got a crush on him because that would have been gross."

Phoebe cocked her head. "Um, I thought Paige said um…"

Willow raised her eyebrows. "That I was gay?" she said bluntly. "Well yeah but it took me awhile to realize that."

Phoebe blushed. "I'm sorry, that was completely inappropriate."

"No problem! I told her she could tell you, I figured it'd be easier that way."

"Do you ever try to hide it?" Phoebe asked curiously.

Willow shrugged. "Nope. Besides, it's hard to talk about magic without talking about my first girlfriend Tara, especially when I talk about losing control and going into black magic when she died."

"Paige told us a little about that too." Phoebe said softly, patting Willow's hand. She could tell it was hard for her to talk about this but knew she was working on it so she could talk to students about it. "Did she tell you that I went evil too?"

Willow shook her head.

"Oh boy. I was queen of the underworld." She grimaced, remembering how hard it had been after that situation.

"But, you're a Charmed one! Your magic comes from such goodness!"

"I'm sure yours does too. But it doesn't really matter, anyone can go down the wrong path. Although I do have to point out I was tricked into that marriage."  
"Marriage?"

"Are you telling the poor girl about Cole? She doesn't need to hear that!" Piper reentered the room.

"We were sharing stories about being evil – and becoming good again." She emphasized.

"Well, you can do that after dinner. Come on, come on." She ushered her sister and their guest into the living room. Willow did get to hear the whole Cole story over dinner, as well as many tales of the Charmed Ones turning into other evil beings. Only when she started trying to conceal her yawns did Paige insist on orbing her back to Magic School.

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"Willow really does seem nice. I'm glad that all worked out for you Paige." Phoebe commented when her sister reappeared without Willow.

"I told you she was. You two really seemed to hit it off. You ever considered batting for the other team sis?" she teased, bumping her older sister with her hip.

Phoebe's eyes went wide. "I don't, I'm not, I mean we were just talking, what's up with you Paige?"

"Whoa! I was just joking, hit a nerve or what?" she looked at her sister more carefully. "Have you?"

"That's none of your business!" Phoebe stormed out of the kitchen and up the stairs, leaving her sisters staring at each other in amazement.

"I really was just joking, but now I'm not so sure." Paige muttered.

"Phoebe? Come on, she can't keep her hands off men."

"I didn't say she was gay, she could like both you know."

"I think I would have known."

"Okay, but don't you think that was a bit weird?"

Piper opened her mouth, but found she couldn't really deny it, so she just closed it again.

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	4. Xander

Disclaimers in part 1.

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"Hey Wills how's it going?" Paige popped her head into Willow's office. She'd started hanging out with Paige and Piper more often after that first dinner at their house a few weeks ago. She was really enjoying her new life in San Francisco. Only one thing bothered her, and that was that after the initial night Phoebe acted much more distant. She hoped she hadn't done something wrong, as she had really liked the middle sister, and it was interesting to talk to someone else who had felt the allure of dark magic and given it up.

"Day just got better!" Willow said, walking around her desk to take one of the kids in Paige's arms. "Hey Chris!" She had really taken a liking to the youngest Halliwells. "Danger?"

"Not this time, just wanted to give their parents some alone time so I thought I'd bring them to the nursery for a while."

"You know, I'm glad you're here. I wanted to ask a favor. I wouldn't ask, but he's so far away and he'd have to take like five flights and-"

"You want me to orb him here instead. We talking about Xander?"

Willow nodded sheepishly. "Would you? Supposedly it's just for a visit but I'm going to try and convince him to stay."

Paige smiled. "You want me to get him now?"

Willow blinked. "Um, okay. I should call him first though. Yay for the new council giving everyone satellite phones!" she dialed a ridiculously long number and waited until her friend picked up.

"Hey Xand how does right now sound to you? No, I'm not kidding! Don't you remember I told you about Paige? She's gonna orb you here. I know! Seriously useful. So yeah, are you all packed? You're bringing everything right? Don't want anything to get lost or anything. Well sure, of course it would also make it easier if you decided to stay." She rolled her eyes at Paige, who giggled. "Okay then, she'll be there in a minute. Don't be freaked, it's a little freaky. See you soon!"

"You want me to take the kids to the nursery first?" Paige asked. Wyatt had found a toy in the corner and was busy sliding things around on wires.

"Leave them here. I uh…I found that toy and hadn't returned it to the nursery yet…"

"Aw, you stole a toy for Wyatt? It'd be cute if it wasn't slightly bizarre." Paige laughed. "Okay, be back in a sec!"

In slightly more than a sec, Paige and Xander reappeared, Xander wearing a giant backpack.

"Whoa, Willow, was that great or what?"

"Xander!" She carefully handed Chris to Paige before attacking her best friend with a massive hug.

"I missed you too."

"Had enough alone time finally?" After the end of Sunnydale, Xander had announced he needed some time. He agreed to work for the new council but wanted to do it wandering around in the wilderness. Willow thought he needed some time to think about and grieve Anya's death in his own way. She could understand where he was coming from.

Paige smiled at the greeting. She wondered what happened to Xander's eye, and before she stopped herself, she asked out loud.

"Oh, well there was this preacher…"

"An evil preacher." Willow put in.

"He was working with the First Evil, and last year when we were fighting him…."

"I still don't understand why you didn't have a whitelighter." She said, more to Willow, with whom she'd had this conversation before.

"Well, Xander's not a witch anyway. Just a really brave man."

"Still, you guys were fighting evil, and you were a witch."

"I know."

"What's a whitelighter, and what does it have to do with my eye?" Xander asked, looking back and forth between the women.

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"I really shouldn't be doing this." Leo said, looking at Xander's eyepatch.

"It was done by evil, just kind of a long time ago." Willow advocated.

"I know…"

"Then let me try." Paige put in suddenly.

"Um….honey you can't heal, remember?" Phoebe informed her.

"Well they said that I'm becoming a real whitelighter right? I mean soon I'm going to get charges and everything? So my powers must be growing. I haven't tried healing in a long time. Let me try. Then if it wasn't allowed we can say I was just trying and we didn't think it would work!"

Xander looked at her with his good eye. "You want me to be your guinea pig?"

"The worst that could happen is nothing." Leo assured him.

The sisters and Willow all looked at him expectantly. He sighed.

"Pretty women have such power. Okay. Go ahead."

Paige placed her hands over his eye and closed her own, concentrating. At first nothing happened but then a faint gold glow started emanating from her palms.

"You're doing it! Keep going!" Phoebe cheered. "Sorry!" she whispered, at an admonishing look from her brother-in-law. But she caught Willow grinning at her, green eyes twinkling.

The glow stopped, and Paige opened her eyes. "I think I did it. Take the patch off, let's see! That felt so strange, by the way."

"Just imagine what it felt like for me." Xander said, sitting up.

"Oh, I know what that feels like. Leo's healed us dozens of times."

"Xander! You have an eye!" Willow screeched, throwing herself on her best friend. "Can you see?"

"Well I could, until someone knocked me to the floor." He joked.

"Sorry!" she jumped off of him and brushed herself off as Paige reached her hand down to help up the newly healed man.

"Thanks." He said, staring into her eyes for far too long as the rest of the group watched the pair with knowing smiles.

"You look even prettier in 3-D." he tried to joke it off. Paige just blushed.

"Have you seen San Francisco in 3-D?" she asked.

"Not even in 2-D. Want to help me out with that?"

She grinned and sauntered out of the room, Xander following her like a puppy.

Piper rolled her eyes. "Leo, let's go get the kids." He took her hand and they orbed away, leaving Willow and Phoebe alone.

"Gee, Paige didn't even show me the town yet." Willow said.

Phoebe laughed. "How much of the town do you think they'll actually get to?" she asked suggestively.

Willow wrinkled her forehead. "What do you…OH!" she turned red.

"Sorry your friend bailed on you the first night he's here."

"I can't blame him, if a beautiful woman offered to 'show me around town' I'd bail on him too." She grinned, using her fingers to put quotes around the words.

Phoebe laughed nervously. Willow took it the wrong way.

"Phoebe, did I…are you uncomfortable with this? With me?" she asked.

"What? No, of course not. Why would I be uncomfortable?"

"I'm not exactly sure, we seemed to be getting along so well the first night we met, but since then whenever I'm around you seem nervous. Is it something I said, something I'm doing?"

Phoebe looked away. "It's not you, Willow, it's me, I'm uncomfortable with myself, okay?"

"Why?"

Phoebe was quiet so long that the redhead almost couldn't stand it. Finally, she asked quietly "Are you attracted to me?"

Even though Willow had assumed the nervousness was due to her sexuality, the question still startled her.

"Um. Is that the problem? Phoebe, you're a very attractive woman, but I know you're straight, so you don't have to worry about me hitting on you, if that's what's bothering you."

Phoebe didn't look at her. "But what if I'm not?"

"Not what?"

"Straight." The word came out very softly, but the meaning came across as Phoebe raised her gaze to meet Willow's.

Willow swallowed audibly. "Oh."

"Yeah. See why I said it's about me?"

"Because you think you might be attracted to me and that freaks you out, so you act like you can't stand me?"

"Well when you put it that way."

"Hey, I get it, I totally wigged when I first figured out I liked girls."

"It's not exactly the first time."

Willow raised her eyebrows. "Then why with the wiggins?"

"It's the first time in a long time that it's been with someone there's a… possibility with."

Now her interest was peaked. "But there was someone before? That there was a possibility with?"

"Years ago, yes, in New York, I was kind of in a wild phase…I thought it was mostly that. And it didn't work out so well."

Willow thought for a moment.

"Okay, so I think we've established that we're attracted to each other. We know we're probably going to see a lot of each other in the future. So I think we have two options. One, we decide nothing will ever happen, and we go on as friends. Or two, we see what happens and try it out, running the risk of you freaking out more, or your family freaking out, or it just not working out. What do you think? We don't have to decide right now."

Phoebe grinned. "You're cute when you manage to babble and be logical at the same time."

Willow blushed slightly.

There was silence while both women contemplated the situation. Finally Willow stood up.

"Well, um, like I said no need to decide right now, I guess I'll be getting back to Magic School." She turned to walk out of the room. "You know where to find me if-"

She was cut off by Phoebe, who grabbed her hand, turned her around, and captured her lips in a kiss as their bodies melted together.

When they separated, Willow opened her eyes slowly. "Or, we could decide now." She said softly.

Phoebe just grinned.

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End file.
